


A Shot in the Dark

by DarknessAroundUs



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Coffee Shops, Eloping, F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Getting Back Together, Implied/Referenced Torture, Moral Ambiguity, Spies & Secret Agents, fast burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-11-27 15:44:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20950871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarknessAroundUs/pseuds/DarknessAroundUs
Summary: Getting back together + Fluff + Spy Betty.That’s it. That’s the fic.Canon Divergence after season 3. Set ten years in the future.





	A Shot in the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> I'm posting on a Tuesday because we will be traveling all of Wednesday (not the fun kind).  
This is canon compliant through the end of season three. This is a future fic. I’ve been writing lots of long complicated stories lately and I wanted to write something short and fluffy and fun and this is it! 
> 
> It’s a little morally ambiguous, a little over the top, but after all this is Riverdale. 
> 
> The lyrics are from I Will Wait for You by Mumford & Sons,
> 
> Also this is loosely set in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Cafe Grumpy is a real place (or rather places now, as they have more than one location. Although clearly they're not owned by a fictional character. 
> 
> So much gratitude is owed to KittiLee for beta-ing and for creating a great graphic you can see on Tumblr (i'm darknessaroundus over there as well).

Jughead’s sweeping Cafe Grumpy. It’s seven at night. The last of the laptop campers left half an hour ago. His only employee, Kevin, is long gone. 

He and Kevin hadn’t gotten along well back in the day but after the cult deprogramming, things improved. It helped that Kevin makes one of the best cappuccinos in the borough and doesn’t ask Jughead any dumb questions about his name or past relationships (ok, relationship).

It’s one of the last days of September, and outside the sun is setting, the glow more gentle than its summer peak. 

The large puddle in the middle 7th Ave reflects the purple tinged sky perfectly. Jughead stops sweeping. It’s one of those rare moments in time where it feels like something monumental is about to happen. He hadn’t felt this way since leaving Riverdale. 

The last decade of his life has been ordinary, free from dead bodies, traitorous parents, and street races. The only crime he prevented recently involved a purse snatcher. He hasn’t committed a crime that wasn’t jay-walking since freshman year at NYU (and in any case it’s legal now).

Jughead returns to sweeping. Over the sound system Marcus Mumford sings,_ I came home like a stone, and I fell heavy into your arms, these days of dust which we've known, will blow away with this new sun._

Once the detritus is all gathered in the dustpan, Jughead dumps it in the garbage can in the alley. 

There’s a sudden bang behind him, like the lid of a bin not a gun, and he turns towards it. At the far end of the alley there’s a woman with long red hair in a braid. 

She’s wearing jeans and a black t-shirt, what Jughead thinks of as the standard server uniform. He can’t see her face but there’s something about the way she walks that seems familiar. It’s hard to put his finger on why. 

Jughead keeps watching her in case she turns at the last minute, but she doesn’t. Instead she disappears behind the back door of Mother Rice, a hipster pan-asian restaurant Jughead can’t stand.

He goes back inside Cafe Grumpy and wipes the counter down, then gathers the compost and goes to empty it out back. As Jughead’s steps into the alley he spots the same woman from earlier, but now he can see her face.

She’s running full tilt down the alley towards him and right away he knows that it’s her. 

Her nose is a little different, the shape of her chin is altered somehow, but her eyes, even with brown contact lenses in them, could only belong to one person - Betty Cooper. 

Betty must recognize him as well because she winks as she runs past. A smile appearing on her lips for a moment. 

Only once she’s turned the corner does Jughead realize he’s dumped half a days worth of used coffee grounds on his feet. 

He’s always known that he still loves her, but seeing her, in disguise and on the run, has made it clear that he has to do something about it.

That night, in his one bedroom apartment, above the pub whose burgers he loves a little too much, he calls a number he hasn’t in a decade. 

The line rings for what feels like a long time and then a male voice answers, “Hi.” 

“Chic?” Jughead asks. The voice sounds too high to be Chic, but it could have changed. Jughead hasn’t talked to his half brother since the senior year of high school. 

Chic stopped working for the FBI and switched over to the CIA after Alice died in the aftermath of the farm. For reasons that Chic dismissed as bureaucratic, he spent most of that year in Riverdale. 

During that year Chic had tried to recruit both Betty and Jughead to work for him. At first it was just subtle hints peppered here and there, when he took them for hikes or milkshakes at Pop’s. But later, when he made them shoot rounds at the gun range and took them skydiving, he was more forward about it. 

Jughead, always the contrarian, had pulled away and made excuses not to go for three hour runs. Instead he’d watched B horror movies with Jellybean and tried to help FP be a better sheriff. 

Betty started going with Chic to martial arts classes a few times a week. Every morning she would wake up early and run for miles when it was still dark out. 

At the time Jughead had resented Betty’s sudden devotion to new things. Only years after she left, during a particularly painful therapy session, did Jughead realize that Betty only did these things because she had been so desperate for family and structure. Her life had been gutted and moving in with the Jones’s didn’t fix that.

Still Jughead and Betty had stayed together all through senior year. They made dinner and packed JB’s lunches as a team. Betty moved into Jughead’s Bedroom. FP made it clear that she was welcome to stay there as long as she was Jughead’s girlfriend. In retrospect Jughead understands how tenuous her situation was.

The Jones house was never on a schedule. Even JB was up at all hours of the night, and many household chores like cleaning and grocery shopping fell on Betty, not by plan but by accident. Although in the spring FP hired a cleaner and Jughead took over the grocery shopping, he wishes now they weren’t so slow to help.

Betty slept rarely and cried often but Jughead dismissed it as temporary, a stage.  
But Chic’s regime helped give Betty purpose in a way Jughead’s video game habits didn’t. Jughead could feel Betty slowly being tugged by Chic into a future different than the one Jughead had hoped for.

When they graduated from Riverdale High on a rainy day in June, Betty had asked Jughead just once if he wanted to join her in training. He had laughed her off. He assumed that he had the whole summer to talk her out of it. 

There’s a photo of them, just after the graduation ceremony, cap and gowns still on, kissing. Veronica had snapped the photo without Jughead knowing. It was their last photo together, their last kiss, captured. 

The silence on the other end of the line lasted for over a minute and Jughead almost hung up before a more familiar male voice says, “Jughead, It’s been a while.”

“I saw Betty tonight.”

“She told me.”

“Can I talk to her?” Jughead asks. He knows that Chic can hear the desperation in his voice, there’s no way to hide it.

“You could have been like her you know, you could have been with her. Instead you chose a different life.” 

As soon as Chic stops speaking there’s a beep. The call has ended and Jughead can’t help but wish for the good old days when there was a dial tone to keep one company.

“Fuck!” Jughead says as he flings his phone. The act of throwing the phone doesn’t make him feel any better. Punching the mattress doesn’t’ help either.

Jughead retrieves his phone and calls Archie who lives five subway stops away in lower Manhattan. 

Archie and Veronica have a townhouse in the east village. He has brunch with them every Sunday. 

The three of them never mention Betty, even though he knows they all still love her. When she left they were all furious with her in their own way. Although over time that furry has been replaced by understanding. They now relize how much she covered up with a Cooper smile. 

Jughead doesn’t tell Archie why he’s so upset, but Archie has no problem meeting him at the boxing gym and going a few rounds while not talking about it. 

The next morning when Jughead arrives at Cafe Grumpy, Kevin is already a quarter into his shift. Kevin’s eyes gleam in a specific way Jughead’s come to associate with gossip, so the first thing Jughead says to Kevin isn’t good morning but rather, “What happened?”.

“The man who lives above Mother Rice was murdered last night.”

This fact in and of itself is not exactly a shock, Jughead knew Betty was running away for a reason that didn’t involve deep friend organic tofu fritters or a bad tip. 

Jughead hasn’t seen Betty in ten years, he doesn’t know where her head is at, but whatever she did, he supports her completely. 

There’s a reason that Jughead never talks about Betty to other people. He can’t really stand to call her his ex-girlfriend, when she is the love of his life. 

Not that he can tell Betty that. He has no way to call her or send her an email. She’s certainly not on social media. The only way he’s ever had to contact her was Chic’s phone number, and clearly that didn’t work out how he hoped.

The next morning is Sunday, the one day of the week he opens the shop. He opens at eight but Brooklyn wakes up slowly on Sundays and so his first customer doesn’t usually arrive till 8:30.

Jughead usually drinks a cup of coffee and reads the New York Times while waiting for the first customer to show up. He hasn’t even finished pulling the shots for his drink when the chime above the door dings and he looks up to see Betty. 

This time she looks more like herself. Whatever she did to alter her features before was temporary. Now her nose is her own.

“ Hi Jug,” She says, and he can’t help himself, he hops over the counter (health codes be damned) and kisses her.

He expects her to pull away, instead she kisses back, and a minute later it’s him who is coming up for air.

“I missed you,” she says. Her lipstick is smudged a little. Jughead’s sure his lips are tinged red by it. He couldn’t care less.

“I’m sorry I didn’t support you better.” 

She shrugs in a way that conveys easy forgiveness, and says “I’m sorry I left.”

Jughead’s never believed in beating around in the bush. He’s gotten even better at prioritizing the important things over time. That’s why the next words out of his mouth are “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” 

They’ve both had their hearts broken, Jughead’s sure of that. But this pull between them is stronger than all that. There are no hard feelings here.

Jughead grabs a sharpie and scrawls Emergency, Closed. Open again Mon. on the back of an empty coffee bag and tapes it to the inside of the glass door.

They hold hands all the way to Jughead’s apartment. He doesn’t dare to kiss her again in public. He feels too much, wants too much.

Jughead is about to open the door to his building when Betty lets go of his hand and says, “I’m not going to quit my job.” 

She doesn’t say the word assassin but it’s implied. 

“That’s fine,” Jughead says, pulling her upstairs.

They fuck in the kitchen and they screw around on the sofa. Only in the evening, after eating take-out Indian food, do they make love in his bed. The lights stay on. 

After, he examines her body in a way he was too distracted to before. There’s more scars than there used to be. One runs up her side from her hip to her armpit in a continuous line. He doesn’t bother asking if it hurt.

They spend a lot of time talking. So much that they don’t really sleep. He tells her about NYU and working shifts at Think Coffee, about how Archie and Veronica are married now. He tells her that he hasn’t dated since she left and she whispers back that she hasn’t either, that when you know what love is, like doesn’t cut it.

Betty doesn’t tell him much about work in terms of details but she says Chic is her boss, that she’s seen the whole world, that all of her personal items can now fit in a single suitcase. He tells her that he’d love to hold onto it for her. With anyone else he’d never say those words, with her he doesn’t even second guess them.

When the pub closes below them, a crowd of happy drunks spill into the street like they do almost every night of the week. For the first time in a long time Jughead isn’t woken up their noise, and he doesn’t feel lonely in comparison.

“Why didn’t you look for me earlier?” Jughead asks, his hand on Betty’s lower back, his stomach pressed against hers, her shirt rucked up.

“I didn’t need to look for you. I knew where you were. I’ve always known. Sometimes when I’m in town I’d walk by Cafe Grumpy just to feel close to you.”

Jughead’s body trembles, Betty presses a kiss to his cheek and adds, “I’ve wanted to reach out for so long, but I didn’t know if you were ready for me. If you would accept this version of me.” 

Jughead laughs with relief. “I’d accept any version of you, Betty.”

“Why didn’t you reach out to me earlier? Chic was always a phone call away.”

He thinks of how many times he wanted to dial that number but let his anger and frustration with Chic overwhelm him instead. He hadn’t known if Betty was ready either. Now she was very much her own person. Calm in a way he’d never seen her before. Happy again. 

Her job isn’t easy, her body shows signs of that, but it does seem to be a good fit for her.

Jughead takes a deep breath and says, “I was too scared. I was struggling for a long time. It took me a lot of therapy to get where I am.”

“Me too. That and becoming the most dangerous person in the room.”

Betty is definitely the most dangerous person in his room right now, but Jughead has never felt safer.

They don’t fall asleep till after 3 AM, but she’s gone when he wakes up. Jughead’s not bereft. She left a note on the table that says, “Tell no one. Be back on the 20th”. 

Every day after that one he gets a call at the same time from a different number. It’s always Betty. They can only talk for a few minutes. 

She arrives on the 20th just as he’s closing up the cafe. Jughead’s already scheduled Kevin for work on the 21st and the 22nd, as Betty warned him that she could stay only for that long. 

The Betty who arrives at Cafe Grumpy looks nothing like the assassin he knows her to be. She blends in perfectly with the stroller pushing moms of Park Slope - light make-up, casual jeans, an expensive purse. 

She’s pulling a sleek black roller suitcase and he knows what that must mean. His whole body feels like it’s smiling.

Over breakfast she tells him that he can’t tell Kevin, Archie or Veronica about her. Chic’s allowing her to see him but no one else “For now,” she says, as she sips her coffee. 

“Is there a time limit on this?” Jughead asks, nervously. 

He understands falling back together isn’t exactly normal, but it feels that way for them. He’d just assumed that this would be the way things were. A little awkward given Betty’s secret work (there were certainly no employee Christmas parties in either of their futures), but manageable. 

“Not on this,” she says pressing her hand against his cheek. “The time limit is on work.” 

“Do assassins get to retire early?”

Betty’s jaw drops, “Is that what you think I am?”

“Yes. Are you not one? Did you not kill the person who lived above Mother Rice?”

“I did. But that’s just a small part of my life. I’m much more Sidney Bristow in the first season of Alias than The Bride in Kill Bill.’ 

After Betty leaves, Jughead makes sure to watch Alias. He tries to imagine himself punching and skydiving at Betty’s side and he can’t. It seems absurd that Chic even considered him a candidate for all that. 

His takeaway from Alias is that Betty kills when she has to, but it’s just one small part of her job. 

He gets other hints at what she does by the bruises that fade in and out on her body, by the way she speaks Mandarin at one bodega, Korean at another.

Whenever he asks her a direct question like, “Have you ever killed a man with a chopstick?” or “Can you climb up the side of a building like Jason Bourne?” she always replies with the word no. 

Jughead has always been good at reading Betty though, so he can tell when the no actually means yes, and when it means no. 

That’s how he knows that she has been stuck in a bank vault for over four hours but she’s never had to fight a lion with her bare hands. 

His life goes from one of monotony to one that has a second layer, the part of his life he shares with Betty makes everything else better.

It’s hard to keep this a secret from everyone. He’s so much happier now and it shows. His customers make jokes that he should change the name of the cafe. 

Kevin and Archie tease him about it at first, but let it drop when it’s clear he’s not about to tell them anything. 

Veronica is particularly suspicious, but over time she grows confident that he has a secret girlfriend (“or boyfriend, I don’t judge”). Jughead doesn’t see the point of having a secret anything if it isn’t Betty. 

It’s hard being far away from the person who holds your heart, but they write each other letters every day and exchange them when they see each other in person.

Betty sometimes stays in New York for up to a week at a time, but it’s unsafe for her to leave the house. Sometimes they’ll go for 2 AM walks in Prospect Park or hit up the all night diner in Gowunus for milkshakes. 

At first every time Betty leaves for work, Jughead is sure that Betty’s going to be killed, but over time the worry fades. 

Two years later on Christmas day, Jughead unwraps a blue box from Betty that contains only a framed page from a painting a day calendar. The painting is “Blonde Girl on a Bed” by Lucian Freud. The date is June 22nd.

He’s not sure what to make of it till she says, “It’s retirement day.”

“Oh,” he says, and then he’s kissing her. Only much later does she open her present from him, an album of photos of the two of them throughout the years. She cries.

That January Betty’s on a mission so deep she can’t even call. Instead she shows up on February first. He’s already asleep in his apartment when she crawls in through the window even though she’s had a key for years.

She’s wakes him up with kisses and leaves before dawn. By the 17th, she’s back with Belgium chocolates and shorter hair. 

In March, Chic visits Cafe Grumpy during a rainstorm. Chic doesn’t bother saying Hi. Instead he says, “You’re the reason she’s leaving us. She’s the best agent I've ever worked with.”

“She’s also a human being.” Jughead points out. 

Chic stays and scowls silently at him for another 15 minutes. Chic is evidently more menacing than the storm as the few potential customers who duck out of the rain, don’t stay.

In April, Betty arrives sporting a newly reattached finger. Jughead asks her if that’s ever happened before and she says no and he knows she means yes. It’s upsetting but she’s getting out soon. 

On the 22nd of June, he and Kevin are both busy with the last of the post lunch crowd when Betty enters in a blue sundress.

Kevin spots her first and shouts, “Betty Fucking Cooper, where’ve you been?” 

Jughead kicks Kevin in the shins even though he’d much rather go kiss Betty. 

“Can you at least try and pretend to be professional?” Jughead asks Kevin. Everyone in the cafe is now staring at Betty.

Kevin’s jaw drops, “You’ve been in touch?”

“That’s one way to put it,” Jughead says quietly enough so the line doesn’t hear. 

“It’s nice to see you too Kevin,” Betty says when it’s her turn to order. 

When Betty’s drink is done Jughead leaves with his hand around her waist.

They run back to his apartment. Only Jughead is out of breath when they get there.

When they get inside Jughead asks, “Are you really out?” His body pressed against hers, though they’re both still fully clothed.

“For now and forever.”

“Should we get married before dinner with Archie and Veronica tomorrow, or after?”

“Definitely before.” She says, pressing a kiss into the side of his neck. 

Jughead tries to focus on anything other than how good it feels to have her right there, to know that she’s here to stay. “Don’t you want a ring first?”

“I couldn’t care less,” she says and then there’s no talking for a while. 

Jughead gives her the ring, from where he’s hidden it in the medicine cabinet, after. He doesn’t even bother pulling on boxers. It’s definitely not a proposal they can tell their kids about. 

The next day at dinner, Veronica’s delighted to see Betty for the first time in twelve years, then she’s furious to discover she missed out on the wedding. Finally, by the time they’re eating dessert Veronica is calm again. That’s when she asks Betty where’s she’s been all these years.

“I’ve been working for the CIA.” Betty says, taking a small bite of the chocolate cake in front of her.

“Oh, that’s exciting. You must have traveled a lot.”

“Some.” Betty says, resting a hand on Jughead’s thigh. He knows she doesn’t want to talk about this. As much as they’re both happy she’s out, he knows she will miss that life. That it will never be something she can talk about casually over cake. 

“Have you ever killed anyone?” 

“Ronnie!” Archie says, his voice edged with shock and horror.

“No.” Betty says in a way that means yes to everyone at the table but Archie who sinks back into his chair with clear relief. 

“Any good at hand to hand combat?” Veronica asks.

“I’m a fair fighter.” Betty says. Jughead’s never seen her fight properly of course, but someone tried to mug them once in Prospect Park, and she took him without doing much more than flinching. 

Veronica’s always been good at taking an advantage of any business opportunity, and so Jughead’s not exactly shocked when Betty starts teaching self-defense classes a few months later at a studio Veronica set up for her. 

Veronica’s named the studio Deadly Defense. Within a year Betty makes enough to buy the studio outright. 

Betty’s one on one training sessions are so expensive Jughead chokes when he first hears the price yet they book out months in advance. 

Because of the training sessions Jughead gets to see Betty press her foot against a lot of people’s throats over the years, including three A list actors, and an uncountable number of millionaires. 

That has nothing on how awe inspiring Betty’s pain management skills are when she gives birth to the twins. 

“In thirty years of work, I’ve never seen anything like it!” The doctor confesses to Jughead after, as Marlow and Sidney bawl in the background. 

Jughead shrugs and plays dumb. He does the same thing fifteen years later, when a bully who targeted the twins ends up confessing his actions to the principle and then the police.

Jughead assumes Betty’s behind the teenager’s confession, but when he asks her about it, Betty’s no is an honest one. Sidney’s on the other hand is very revealing.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I'm always grateful for comments and feedback of any kind! I also have lots of head canons for this fic. I might share some in the comments.


End file.
